Tuesday, March 03, 2015

IT WAS INTENDED TO BE A NON-POLITICAL CALL FOR WAR: “I deeply regret that some perceive my being here as political. That was never my intention.”

STAND UP, SIT DOWN, FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT: “I know that no matter on which side of the aisle you sit, you stand with Israel.”

“The remarkable alliance between Israel and the United States has always been above politics. It must always remain above politics.” “Politics” is how things get decided. What he means is it must always remain unquestioned.

“Some of what the president has done for Israel is less well known. I called him in 2010 when we had the Carmel forest fire... In each of those moments, I called the president, and he was there.” Cursing the lack of Caller ID on White House phones.

He complains that Ayatollah Khamenei tweets about Israel.

“Iran’s goons in Gaza, its lackeys in Lebanon, its revolutionary guards on the Golan Heights are clutching Israel with three tentacles of terror.” First, he gets points for “goons,” a goofy word we do not hear nearly enough these days. Second, “three tentacles of terror” suggests that he spends his Saturday nights watching bad movies on the SyFy Channel, eating Ben & Jerry’s while checking Khamenei’s Twitter feed to see if he’s talking about him.

“We must all stand together to stop Iran’s march of conquest, subjugation and terror.” Again with the standing.

DA DUM DA DA DA DUM DUM DA DEE: “In this deadly game of thrones, there’s no place for America or for Israel, no peace for Christians, Jews or Muslims who don’t share the Islamist medieval creed, no rights for women, no freedom for anyone.” But a lot of frontal nudity.

PUT A RING ON IT: “the greatest dangers facing our world is the marriage of militant Islam with nuclear weapons.”

He makes clear that it’s not just a non-nuclear Iran he wants, it’s an Iran whose economy is strangled permanently:

Would Iran be less aggressive when sanctions are removed and its economy is stronger? If Iran is gobbling up four countries right now while it’s under sanctions, how many more countries will Iran devour when sanctions are lifted? Would Iran fund less terrorism when it has mountains of cash with which to fund more terrorism?

So any deal with Iran that includes the lifting of sanctions must be unacceptable. It’s almost like he doesn’t want negotiations to succeed.

“This deal won’t be a farewell to arms. It would be a farewell to arms control.” Some of his rhetoric in this speech is pretty good. This is kind of lame.

It is literally an irresponsible speech, a speech that says what he wants to happen and what he doesn’t want to happen, but leaves it to others to figure out how to comply with his wishes. It is Bibi talk.